Monday, November 29, 2010

Americans not impressed with Bloomberg

Massive amounts of attention have been given over the last few years to a possible Michael Bloomberg Presidential run in 2012. And a new PPP poll finds that he is indeed a unifier- Democrats, Republicans, and independents all don't like him.

Only 19% of Americans expressed a favorable opinion of Bloomberg on our most recent national poll while 38% said they see him unfavorably. That -19 favorability spread makes him more unpopular than Barack Obama, Mike Huckabee, Mitt Romney, and even Sarah Palin and places him slightly ahead of only Newt Gingrich. Republicans are the most negative toward him, giving him a 12/48 favorability. Independents weigh in at 19/37, and only Democrats even come close to rating him positively with 24% saying they have a favorable opinion of him to 30% with a negative one.

Tested in a hypothetical three way contest with Barack Obama and Mitt Romney Bloomberg registers at only 11% with Obama getting 44% and Romney 38%. Bloomberg does decently with independents, getting 22%. But he has very little appeal to partisans- only 6% of Democrats say they would vote for him, less even than Romney's 8%, and just 9% of Republicans say he'd receive their support.

It does appear at this point that Bloomberg would hurt Republicans (or at least Romney) more than he'd hurt Obama. Asked who they would support in a head to head between Obama and Romney, 50% of Bloomberg's supporters say Romney to only 21% for Obama. As a result that gives Obama a 6 point lead in a three way with Romney when it's only a single point in a head to head. Obama's approval rating with the Bloomberg voters is just 22%. Bloomberg seems to be drawing support from voters who don't much care either for Obama or for the GOP- and that's a group that skewed strongly toward the Republicans in this year's election.

Obviously the millions Bloomberg would throw at a Presidential bid could make a big difference in how he's perceived- but as we saw with Meg Whitman this year it's also possible endless spending wouldn't change his image much at all. At this point it doesn't look like he would be a serious player in 2012.

9 comments:

Since Romney is considered a relatively 'moderate' Republican (as far as those things go), perhaps a better test would be to poll Bloomberg vs. Obama vs. Palin. That's pretty much the cap on his support with him being able to stake out the center in that circumstance and the GOP nominating the most polarizing possible candidate.

The Bloomberg thing comes from New Yorkers and media pundits who live in New York. They are the only ones who ever talk about the guy, and that is the only thing that makes him even visible on the radar screen. It's patently absurd to assume that he has either the qualifications or the appeal to ever be a viable candidate for such an office.